From the Daily Lectionary for Tuesday in the Eighteenth Week after Pentecost
Luke 7:1-17
After Jesus had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly, and who was ill and close to death. When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and heal his slave. When they came to Jesus, they appealed to him earnestly, saying, “He is worthy of having you do this for him, for he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us.” And Jesus went with them, but when he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to say to him, “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. For I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it.” When Jesus heard this he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, he said, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” When those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave in good health.
Soon afterwards he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went with him. As he approached the gate of the town, a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow; and with her was a large crowd from the town. When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, “Do not weep.” Then he came forward and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, rise!” The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized all of them; and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has risen among us!” and “God has looked favorably on his people!” This word about him spread throughout Judea and all the surrounding country.
There are two points I want to make about today’s reading in Luke. First, healing is at the heart of Jesus’ ministry. One of the tenets of the “Good News” is that the sick are healed; that God is a God of healing, to the extent that we were created to heal. It is our nature. All four Gospels depict Jesus as a healer. And God’s healing touch extends beyond social status and caste, beyond those deserving and those whom we would say are not. Luke gives us a prime example: Jesus heals a Roman soldier’s slave. Roman soldiers were anathema to the Jewish population of Palestine. They were entrusted to enforce the imperial occupation. They had unmitigated authority, and often that authority became abusive and manipulative and extortive. The Roman soldier in this case exhibits humility on the verge of repentance. Perhaps Luke is saying that even those charged with the enforcement of evil have a conscience within. I wonder about those today who support lawlessness, dishonesty, and racism up and against Jesus’ admonition to love our neighbor. Perhaps there is healing, forgiveness for them? Perhaps the point is that all of us will need forgiveness over a lifetime.
Second, Luke is intent on connecting the figure of Jesus to the prophets in Israel’s history… again, typology. The healing at Nain is a case in point. Centuries before, at the very same place, according to the legend, the prophet Elisha raised a young boy from the dead. It is compassion that drives the prophet, and it is compassion that motivates Jesus. Any Jewish hearer of this story would make the connection. Luke is placing Jesus in the continuum of healing ministry that dates back to prehistory.
It may be useful for us post-modern followers of Jesus in our serving the cause in matters of justice, and helping out the poor, combating racism, and advocating for the left out, to name such work as “healing.” Healing, of course, is not merely a personal matter, but a collective, communal, and systemic one as well. Our nation, the milieu of our common life, is in great need of healing at the present time. It strikes me that the “bending of the arc of the universe towards justice” is a matter of healing…. Not so much change, as it were, but a restoration to health. Might it be that the ministry we do as the baptized, as people of faith and conscience, is at its heart, healing? I think that puts in perspective our high call, our noble responsibility. What do you think?
A Prayer for the Answering of Prayer (BCP p. 824)
O God who has promised to hear the petitions of those who ask in your Son’s name: We ask you to mercifully listen to us who have now made our prayers and supplications to you; and grant that those things which we have asked faithfully according to your will, may effectually be obtained, to the relief of our necessity, and to the setting forth of your glory, through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
